Sage has launched a new CRM channel program. And you won't have details unless you read French and translation software does not make everything clear. But the fact that Sage has launched a channel anywhere should interest those U.S VARs who have concluded Sage is not channel friendly. We will ask if anywhere else is on slate other than France. The limited translation I got suggests the program is designed for obvious purposes—supporting customer needs and increasing partners something or another as the translation software did not generate a meaningful phrase and "to accelerate the sale and integration of cloud".

Blackbaud reported net income of $4.3 million for the first quarter ended March 31, an increase of 12.3 percent from $3.8 million a year earlier. Revenue for the first quarter of $150.5 million was 17.9-percent higher than the $127.6 million. In increased spending contributed to a 13. 6-percent drop in operating income. However, the bottom line was boosted by a 37.1-percent decrease in income tax expense. This week’s earnings webcast involved as much the transition to cloud products as it did more typical financial performance issues.

Xero has posted a letter with two appendices in response to a query by the Australian stock exchange about the recently reported loss for the year ended March 31. Xero's loss of about $54 million was 96 percent higher than in fiscal 2014. The cloud software company's revenue for 2015 was roughly $141 million, 81 percent higher than in the prior year. Also posted on the New Zealand Exchange's website, the Australian Exchange's question was whether a reasonable person would consider the increased loss as having a material impact on the price or value of its securities.

Don Deshaies, VP of channel management, has left Sage North America. Deshaies joined Sage in February 2014 and left to pursue a new opportunity, according to a statement from the company. Since the statement says opportunity, not opportunities, I concluded he is going to another job. (Well, thinking now maybe not). While Sage searches for a replacement, Joo Sohn, director of partner programs will take care of the channel.